Decisions and Destinies
by ncfan
Summary: Galadriel's thoughts as her uncle and cousins swear their fateful Oath.


I own nothing.

* * *

In another time, she might have counseled against this. In times of light, before this darkness or thousands of years after it, when her mind was not clouded with rage and pride and ambition, Artanis would have counseled against this. Perhaps she would not have argued against _Fëanáro_, but she still had affection enough for her half-cousins that, for their sake, she might have tried to dissuade them from the path they had just taken.

But this was not another time. The world was choked in heavy, sticky darkness; Artanis's world was restricted to the radii of torchlight. The smell of smoke clung to her hair and her skin; her nostrils were full of the acrid odor of the plumes of fire. Her heart was full of the desire to journey across the sea, to see the lands the Valar had so long denied to them, and to find a place to rule, unrestricted. There was pride in her heart, and intelligence without wisdom. It would take Artanis a long time to learn wisdom, and temperance was still something that she wrestled with in her heart, and would for millennia more. She said nothing as Fëanáro leapt up before the crowd and swore his Oath, and said nothing as one by one, his sons joined him.

To swear an Oath that took Manwë and Varda as witnesses was no light thing. There were few who committed to such, and Artanis made it a point not to swear oaths at all. She had never been enamored of the idea of binding her will and her fate to the conditions of an oath. Artanis would not trap herself in such a way, and did not consider it wisdom on the parts of anyone else to do such a thing.

But to swear an Oath before Ilúvatar… To swear and Oath that promised the Oath-takers banishment to the Void if it was not fulfilled…

It was no light thing. To swear such an Oath was madness.

Artanis knew enough of Oaths to know the way her uncle and her cousins were now bound. They had sworn an Oath before Ilúvatar to regain Fëanáro's Silmarils, and held Manwë and Varda as witnesses. By the will of Manwë and Varda, by the will of Ilúvatar, they were now bound to regain their Silmarils, or have their spirits thrust into the Void upon death. By the will of the Chiefs of the Valar and the One, they were so bound.

Did any of them, the eight, father and his sons, realize the weight of what they had just done? Did they realize that terrible weight of the wills of those they had sworn by, and called as witnesses? Did they realize that the Oath they swore was now imbued with the will of Ilúvatar, the will of Arda itself, and that that terrible will would drive them? Did they realize that their Oath would indeed drive them to the ends of Arda, to the Door of Night and the Gates of Morning? Did they realize that they would be ruled, without mercy or consideration or kindness, by the Oath they had sworn?

_Do they realize that it shall consume them, if it is not fulfilled?_

She looked at them, her brash uncle and his brash sons, and realize that they did not. The only two who seemed to have any doubts at all were Makalaurë and Maitimo (at least, any doubts that they allowed to show on their faces), the last two to swear, but they had sworn, nonetheless. They had sprung up to stand beside their father and brethren, had drawn their swords and sworn Fëanáro's Oath. They had no idea, not really, not any of them, what they had just done.

Artanis looked at the eight of them, and she saw fire. She always saw fire when she looked at Fëanáro, appropriately enough. She saw fire in the future of the Spirit of Fire, fire and destruction. Never before had she seen any of their father's fire in Fëanáro's sons, not even in Curufinwë, who is most like him of the seven. They were cool flesh and blood, more like the stone their mother sculpted with than their fiery father. But now, the lines of fate had shifted, and she saw fire in all of them. Their fates had changed to match the fate of their father.

Fëanáro's sons would be consumed by fire, just as Fëanáro was being consumed now. As a fire destroyed all that was around it, so would they be consumed, and destroyed, and cause destruction. The House of Fëanáro would descend into ruin before the Enemy was thrown down, and the Silmarils reclaimed.

The Oath would ruin them all.

Artanis did not say this. Nolofinwë and Turukáno sprang up to condemn the Oath Fëanáro and his sons had sworn (And yet they, like Artanis, had stayed silent as Fëanáro swore it, as one by one his sons swore with him. Like Artanis, they made no move to stop them). Her kinsmen descended into squabbling, and Artanis stood tall and silent, apart from it all, thinking.

The Oath would ruin them all, but it did not concern her all that much. Artanis had yet to see the way Fëanáro's Oath would draw her into its dragnet, had yet to see how she herself would be caught. The eyes of her heart did not show her that much. She merely steeled her own resolve, and counted herself grateful that at the very least, she was not the only one with the resolve to cross the Sea.

(In her heart, she did not know whether to be happy or disgruntled that she would not be at the head of the journey. She would surely be overshadowed by her kinsman again in Endóre, just as she had been pushed to the shadows here in Aman. They would not allow her to exercise her will, her natural right. But she would find a way. Artanis would find a way.)

* * *

Artanis—Galadriel  
Fëanáro—Fëanor  
Makalaurë—Maglor  
Maitimo—Maedhros  
Curufinwë—Curufin  
Nolofinwë—Fingolfin  
Turukáno—Turgon

Endóre—Middle-Earth (Quenya)


End file.
